Blinded Victim Will Get $10,000 Sharon Komlos Given State Award

Sharon Patyk Komlos gained national recognition for her courage after she was shot, blinded and raped near Pompano Beach in 1980. But fame did little to feed her children and pay her mortgage.

Good news has finally arrived, however. The state of Florida has agreed to pay her $10,000 from a state victims` compensation fund, more than two years after her application was first turned down.

``I`m very happy, but I won`t believe it until I deposit the check in the bank and it clears,`` she said Monday.

The check is scheduled to arrive in four to six weeks.

Komlos, 35, a mother of three who lives west of Boca Raton, has received national honors, not only because she survived the heinous attack that left her blind, but also because she refused to let it ruin her life.

While traveling on Sample Road in 1980, Komlos was shot in the head by Thomas Edward Rossi, who was driving in a car next to hers. The shot severed her optic nerves, blinding her instantly.

Still conscious and in control of her car, she slowed and pulled to the side of the road. She heard the voice of someone she thought was a Good Samaritan, offering to help her.

The ``Good Samaritan`` was Rossi, who carried her to his apartment, where he raped her and left her for dead. Rossi, who was on parole in New York for a similar attack six years earlier, was convicted of attempted second-degree murder and sentenced to 104 years in prison.

Komlos was blind for life.

Unable to continue her career as an insurance adjuster, she applied for help from the Florida Bureau of Crimes Compensation, which administers a fund to help victims of crime.

But because she had a working husband and because state officials were told that she was eligible for workers` compensation, she was turned down.

But she was also then turned down for a workers` compensation settlement and was divorced from her husband. She was left almost penniless.

Those factors, along with the publicity generated by her case and intercession by state Rep. Irma Rochlin, D-Hallandale, caused the bureau to re-evaluate her case, Director Herbert G. Parker said.

Parker said a Jan. 13 article on the Komlos case in the News/Sun-Sentinel`s Sunshine magazine, sent to him by Rochlin, persuaded him to reopen the case.

``After we saw the story and checked into it, we realized something was wrong,`` Parker said. ``She did not receive workman`s compensation because it was not a job-related injury. We have the authority to reopen any case where new information surfaces which was not considered when we made our original decision.``

When Komlos first applied for the award, the bureau was erroneously informed that she would receive workers` compensation benefits. They also thought that she would get a larger insurance settlement than she actually received, Parker said.

Parker said that without the publicity about the case, his department would never have reconsidered it.

``We usually don`t go back and re-check cases,`` he said.

Rochlin said she had already been looking into ways to improve the victims` compensation fund when she read the article.

``I`m glad I had the chance to right a wrong,`` she said.

Rochlin said she wants to raise the ceiling on awards from the fund to $25,000 from $10,000.

The fund is supported by a $15 surcharge on criminal court fines.

Komlos said the money will be welcome, but she doesn`t consider it a fortune, considering that her oldest child will start college in four years. Her income consists mainly of a Social Security disability check, which she says doesn`t even cover her $650-a-month mortgage payment, and whatever she can make from speaking engagements.

``It`s nerve-wracking to have three active children and no health insurance,`` she said.

Komlos said that there is too much confusion about how to help victims.

``There are a lot of organizations and a lot of jurisdictional problems,`` she said. ``What we need to do is cut through the baloney and the egos and address the problem.``

Komlos` horrifying ordeal has brought her fame, if not fortune.

Last year, she was named ``Citizen of the Year`` by Crimestoppers International and was received a $75,000 ``Endow a Dream`` award from the W. Clement and Jessie Stone Foundation.

But the Stone award was given with the stipulation that the money be donated to charity. Komlos donated the money to a variety of crime prevention and victims` aid organizations.

Komlos said she found it achingly ironic that all that money was passing through her checking account bound for charity while she was having trouble meeting her mortgage payments.

``I didn`t even want to feel any of the checks,`` Komlos said. ``At that point, the financial situation was not good.``

The award did give her a springboard to a career as a motivational speaker.

Before she received the award, she found it difficult to get people to pay for an appearance.

``They would say, `Let`s call good old Sharon, she`ll do it for free,` `` she said.

But the attention has also resulted in small donations, including furniture, from private citizens.

A Broward County court reporter volunteered her services to help her type a book she is writing on her experiences and her philosophy. Its title is Feel the Laughter.